It's been a long day; I've been away from the Internet a lot, and I've only just now had a chance to look at the photos from Japan. I knew it had to be awful, very awful, but the photos are beyond belief.

Japan is as well built to withstand a quake as a country can be--and yet, look. That is what an earthquake can do. 

Turkey isn't well built at all. 

We know exactly what will happen to Istanbul. We know it, in fact, pretty much to the block and to the building. Hundreds of thousands of people will be killed outright when their buildings collapse. About 30,000 natural gas lines will rupture. Even if only 10 percent catch fire—a conservative estimate, given the human instinct to smoke under stress—there will be 3,000 fires. The city’s fire stations are able to handle at most 30 to 40 fires in a day. 

In 1509, an earthquake killed between five and ten percent of the city’s population. The Ottomans called it Kıyamet-i Suğra, the Minor Judgment Day, the end of the world. The population was much less dense back then and living in low wooden buildings, not shoddy concrete apartment blocks. If a similar proportion of the city’s residents were killed today, a million and half would die.

Since then, Istanbul has suffered serious quake damage 11 times, most recently at the end of the 19th century. In 1939, a series of seven quakes in Turkey began, each of a magnitude exceeding 7 on the Richter scale, all on the Anatolian fault line. Each time a major rupture occurs on the fault, it transfers stress further along the line, making a subsequent earthquake more likely. The quakes are marching westward from eastern Turkey, directly toward Istanbul.

Istanbul's my home. It feels like the center of the world. I've been away from it for only twelve hours now and I'm already homesick. It breaks my heart to see these photos of Japan. It terrifies me for Istanbul.

It isn't too late for Turkey to launch something like a Manhattan Project to save the city, to put all of the immense talent and energy Turkey possesses toward doing everything humankind knows how to do to reduce the destruction when it comes. It could still be done.  It would take absolute resolution, cooperation among the major parties, a willingness to make this the nation's foremost priority, but it could be done. 

Why does any politician in Turkey talk about anything but this? Why can't they grasp how serious this is?

My youngest brother (age 11) shares his birthday, February 6th, with Ronald Reagan.  I, on the other hand, share my birthday, March 30, with the anniversary of John Hinckley, Jr.'s assassination attempt on President Reagan.  Though the thirtieth anniversary of that near-tragic day is still a few weeks away, the U.S. Secret Service has just released a heretofore undisclosed soundtrack of the day Reagan -- or 'Rawhide,' as he was identified in the Secret Service -- was shot. 

Take a listen to the soundtrack over at the National Journal.  There, you'll also find Marc Ambinder's moment by moment breakdown of the day's sequence of events.

Just to prove that Richard Epstein and I are not the same person, Richard came over to Berkeley Law yesterday to debate Obamacare with my friend, colleague, and good old New Deal liberal Jesse Choper.

To my surprise, Richard predicted that the Supreme Court would uphold Obamacare, though he was clear that this was because of the sad state of the Supreme Court and not because he thought it consistent with the original meaning of the Commerce Clause.

But what equally caught my attention was that Richard said there were a number of free-market fixes that Republicans could propose in Congress that could do far more to make health care efficient and more broadly available than anything in Obamacare. 

This to me has to be part of the center-right conversation -- it is OK to call for repeal, but to truly win on the issue one has to propose sensible reforms for what most people agree is a dysfunctional system.

I will let Richard post here to do his arguments full justice.  But I think that Ricochet folks could start the process of developing a package of ideas to replace Obamacare when the time comes.

Striking images of the immediate aftermath of today's tragic earthquake, the strongest in Japan's recorded history.

We're probably going to get more of a taste of protest tomorrow, when demonstrators gather in Madison. I don't buy the idea of Republican overreach here. But I do believe that Gov. Scott Walker's victory has energized the base of demoralized Democrats. If I were fighting back across America on collective bargaining and other issues, and I were leading Democrats and union leaders, here would be my rules:

1) Lots of American flags. I saw a bunch in Lansing, where they even sang "God Bless America." That communicates this is about working people, not the professional protest class.

2) Speakers who are union workers, not union leaders. Put faces on your people: a teacher, a copy, a fireman, a sanit worker. Again, takes off the radical edge and creates sympathy.

3) No 60s nostalgia: witness the peace sign made of human bodies that I posted yesterday.

4) As part of #3, no bearded scruffy students being carted away by police for refusing lawful orders to vacate.

5) No Jesse Jackson, for similar reasons.

6) No Michael Moore, for same reasons.

7) Clear efforts to self-police.

Ironically we have seen the kind of peaceful rallies filled with ordinary people these past few months: They are called tea parties. And the ordinariness is one reason why most of America has some sympathy for them.

I believe that the union movement, and even the public-employee union movement, could create more sympathy for itself -- but only if it eschews the nostalgia for the 60s so evident in their militancy, rhetoric, and leaders. And I believe Saul Alinsky, as a matter of tactics, would be with me here.

For all those interested in monetary policy, let me refer to a piece by my former boss and mentor, Seth Lipsky, former WSJ editor, owner of the New York Sun, and author of a new book on the Constitution. It's in the latest issue of Hillsdale College's Imprimis, and, with typical Lipskylike flair, compares the dollar to the kilogram. Let's just say this: it's not your father's article on hard currencies. Here's a sample:

Now, the record is clear in respect of how America’s founders viewed money. Many of them went into the Second United States Congress, where they established the value of the dollar at 371 ¼ grains of pure silver. The law through which they did that, the Coinage Act of 1792, noted that the amount of silver they were regulating for the dollar was the same as in a coin then in widespread use, known as the Spanish milled dollar. The law said a dollar could also be the free-market equivalent in gold. The Founders did not expect the value of the dollar to be changed any more than the persons who locked away that kilogram of platinum and iridium expected the cylinder to start losing mass. In fact, in this same 1792 law, they established the death penalty for debasing the dollar.

Today, members of the Federal Reserve Board don’t worry about how many grains of silver or gold are behind the dollar. They couldn’t care less. And this is what I believe is the most worrisome threat to property rights today. When the value of a dollar plunges at a dizzying rate—at one point in recent months it collapsed to less than ¹/_1,400 of an ounce of gold—Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke goes up to Capitol Hill and declares merely that he is “puzzled.” No “new urgency” to redefine the dollar for him. The fact is that we’ve long since ceased to define the dollar, and it can float not only against other currencies but even against 371 ¼ grains of pure silver.

So, the New York Sun asked, why not float the kilogram? After all, when you go into the grocery to buy a pound of hamburger, why should you worry about how much hamburger you get—so long as it’s a pound’s worth? A pound is supposed to be .45359237 of a kilogram. But if Congress can permit Mr. Bernanke to use his judgment in deciding what a dollar is worth, why shouldn’t he—or some other Ph.D. from M.I.T.—be able to decide from day to day what a kilogram is worth?

Over at NRO, Jim Geraghty has an interview with his anonymous mentor, the political insider source who goes by the name Obi-Wan Kenobi (I know who it is, but I'm not telling).  Geraghty asks Obi if Scott Walker has shot himself in the foot politically by shooting his public unions in the head legislatively.  Here's Obi's response:

"Forget the recalls or the polling. Wisconsin has been too sweet. Remember Margaret Thatcher. She would suggest some bold initiative to her cabinet and then watch the empire’s bravest sons squirming in their red-cushioned seats at 10 Downing worrying about what the media might say and how their precious image might be affected. Mrs. T. would say to herself, in looking at those preening males: “And women are supposed to be vain?” The point here — the lady who was not for turning used to say, “Controversy is good.” That’s how we advance our agenda, how the public finds out what is going on, how the good guys win."

That's excellent and true, I think.  The rest is equally good.  Worth reading.

I report, you decide. 

Israel is a tiny country. Even knowing that, and even having spent a lot of time here before, I tend to forget it. I forget it because it's always in the news, so it winds up feeling more substantial in my mind than it is. It took me a lot less time to get from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem than it does to get across Istanbul during rush hour. And in fact, Israel's population--all of it, Arab and Jew--is about a third that of Istanbul. 

If you haven't seen it yourself, I don't think you can fully grasp the disproportion between the role this country plays in the world's imagination and its size.  When you read about the disputed territories, try to remember that the amount of land in dispute feels, when you look at it, like "about what you'd need to build a good-sized shopping mall."  

8.9 magnitude earthquake hit Japan at 2:46 pm local time, 231 miles north of Tokyo. 13 foot tsunami followed. Casualties unknown.

Tsunami warnings across the Pacific; Hawaii braces for tsunami at 3:00 am local time. 

Prayers to the people of Japan, including outstripp.

Rob Long's review of the latest episode of Klavan on the Culture:

Hilarious.  Especially this part:  "Mmmfmmvmv fgfhshha kkkekkkaslsnsm."

Take a look for yourself:

In this, our first crowd sourced Ricochet Podcast, our members picked the topics -- well, most of them anyhow. So as requested, we dissect the NPR debacle, debate whether Scott Walker has gone all squishy on us, and unwind the continuing federal budget battles. Then, in another Ricochet Podcast first, we're joined by Ricochet members Kenneth and Pilgrim. They reveal what criteria they use when they post, encourage those who are too shy to comment, and then behave like normal guests and completely disagree with the hosts. We finish up with  a little impromptu cowboy poetry and a totally unscripted Sheen rant. So much for rundowns. 

Draw! It's a hail of bullets:

• Alas, Dicker and Dicker of Beverly Hills is not (yet) a sponsor of the Ricochet Podcast. But if we had furs, we'd certainly store them there. 
• Coffee prices are indeed on the move. The New York Times suggests this is because of global warming. We'll leave that to the experts, but nonetheless, lock in the price of your Ricochet membership today!
• What do you mean you haven't heard the Kaus/Limbaugh Podcast yet? Drop everything and listen to it now. Go ahead, we'll wait...
• We're always happy to link to Martini Shot, Rob's weekly commentary on show business for L.A.'s public radio outlet KCRW. By the way, the Martini Shot is is a Hollywood term that describes the final shot set-up of the day. According to Dave Knox, author of the film industry slang guide Strike the Baby and Kill the Blonde, the Martini Shot was so named because "the next shot is out of a glass", referring to a post-wrap drink.
• Ruth Seymour was the General Manager of KCRW from 1978 until she retired last year. She was responsible for not only dragging KCRW and NPR to the center, but for getting the station online very early and creating a strong presence there. She also had the unique ability to make you feel guilty for not giving money to the station.
• We've never gotten the appeal of A Prairie Home Companion either. Maybe it's a mid-western thing? However, in an incredible display of synergy with our podcast, the PHC's next episode apparently features Martin Sheen plays James Joyce in an episode of The Lives of the Cowboys. Way to cash in, Mr. Keillor.
• NPR has conveniently listed all past versions of the All Things Considered theme song here, but the files are encoded in Real Media, which is the web equivalent of wax cylinders. Clearly, they need more federal funding. 
• Rob's post on how robots are the key ingredient to our economic future is here. His piece about his elitist Japanese john appeared in National Review last fall.
• Nanotechnology is the study of manipulating matter on an atomic and molecular scale. Generally, nanotechnology deals with structures sized between 1 to 100 nanometre in at least one dimension, and involves developing materials or devices within that size. Quantum mechanical effects are very important at this scale, which is in the quantum realm. OK, we admit that we just copied and pasted that from Wikipedia, and like Peter, have no idea what it means.
• According to this report from the BBC, illegitimate birth rates in Britain are actually much lower than people believe. The study quoted says that "an oft-quoted figure of one in 10 for the number of children fathered illegitimately is a myth. The real number is more likely to be less than one in 25, researchers say." Seems low to us. 
• Here's Ross Douthat's piece Why Monogamy Matters. 
• Consider yourself warned: if your company is hoping to do business with Marin County, you must first be vetted by their Peace Conversion Commission to make sure you're not involved in the manufacturing of nuclear weapons. We sleep better at night knowing this. 
• We know we promised in the crowd source post that this would be a Sheen free podcast, but James called an audible, as is his right as host (it's in the rule book). But that doesn't mean we have to link to Sheen's Ustream videos.
• Yes, Rob Long is of course available for live cowboy poetry readings. To book him for your next live event, including weddings, book clubs, bar mitzvahs, and Rotary Clubs, please contact his agent. 
• Attention Baxter Black: real cowboys don't have websites, and if even they did, they wouldn't have multiple videos set to autoplay AT THE SAME TIME! Yeesh.

Music from this week's episode:

• This Is Why We Fight by The Decemberists
• (I've Got Spurs) That Jingle, Jangle, Jingle by Tex Ritter and His Texans

The direct link to this week's episode. But be a cow poke and subscribe. Don't use iTunes? Visit our Feedburner page for a number of other subscription options.

The Ricochet Podcast is sponsored by Encounter Books. Our featured title this week is Schools for Misrule: Legal Academia and an Overlawyered America by Walter Olson. Available at EncounterBooks.com and for Kindle at Amazon.com.

If someone wrote this dialogue, and submitted it to me as a script, I'd tell them to ease up a bit.  Too unbelievable.  Too on the nose.   Respect your audience a bit more, I'd tell them.  Don't hit it so hard.

Seriously: the NPR executives recorded here sound like old-time stage villains.  Listen to the way they laugh, around 00:49, when one of the undercover reporters says "We call NPR, National Palestinian Radio."  It's what we in the screenwriting trade would describe this way:  The assembled group laughs evilly, sips their wine.

What's fun, of course, is that this is exactly the way they see us!  This is exactly what they accuse us of sounding like!  Secretive, evil, money-grubbing, and dishonest.

Don't miss the section around 22:00, when NPR (About to be Former) Senior Director of Institutional Giving talks about how and why the undercover reporter could keep his $5 million gift to NPR anonymous.  It's just a matter of deciding how to "structure" his identity in the "database."

This is bad potboiler dialogue.  If it was a script I was producing, I'd send the writer back for another draft before I paid for it.  

Of course in this instance, we've all already paid for it.

Tomorrow is Justice Antonin Scalia’s 75^th birthday, so I hope you’ll join me in wishing him a happy one.  And hey, what's your favorite Scalia dissent?  (I vote for Roper v Simmons, where he sticks it to his colleagues for the "sophistry" of citing foreign law in constitutional cases).

I particularly want to extol the good Justice, given that Linda Greenhouse, who covers – and I use the term loosely – legal affairs for the NYT, has chosen the occasion to pen a gratuitous attack on Scalia.  In the Times opinionator blog, Greenhouse writes that Scalia’s birthday “doesn’t promise to be a happy one” because “Antonin Scalia, approaching his 25th anniversary as a Supreme Court justice, has cast a long shadow but has accomplished surprisingly little.”   

The rationale for this bizarre assertion is that Scalia’s “bomb-throwing” dissents rarely influence future decisions. Except Scalia doesn’t write dissents to persuade his fellow justices.  As he explained himself in a 2008 interview: 

Who do you think I’m writing my dissents for? I’m writing for the next generation and for law students . . . But I’m not going to persuade my colleagues and I’m not going to persuade most of the federal bench. They’ve had this so-called living Constitution stuff, you know, from the time they were in law school. That’s not going to change. But maybe the next generation will see the advantages of going back to the way we used to do things. (ht Volokh Conspiracy)

By this standard, Scalia's career on the bench is a smashing success. He has inspired a whole generation of lawyers.   

But for the record, Greenhouse’s assertion that Scalia has accomplished little” is utterly laughable.  As the WSJ law blog points out: “he alone is largely responsible for the 'Originalism' movement, which, some would argue, provided the court an entirely new lens through which to view the Constitution.”  And in fact, Scalia’s dissents on issues such as the unitary executive, partial-birth abortion, and sixth amendment confrontation rights have eventually commanded majorities.  Not to mention Scalia’s majority opinion in the ground-breaking Heller case that restored Second Amendment rights. 

 I suspect that Greenhouse and other leftwing commentators only wish that they had a voice on the bench half as eloquent as Scalia's.

I never thought I'd ever hear myself saying I'm with Columbia (on anything). But I am if this account from National Review is accurate. It reports that Columbia canceled a planned speech by the VP for the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, on the grounds that he had a few years ago disrupted a Columbia commencement. It seems to me that if universities enforced not speech codes but basic civility and respect for others, we would all be better off. Animal rights is a very interesting debate, and there are any number of people who can make the case for it who do not believe in disruption.

I can't find anything about the 2004 incident that is said to have led to this cancelation. I grant you the double standards given some of the other people who have spoken at Columbia. But I do not see why we should treat people who one day will disrupt and another day debate as members of a civil society dedicated to open debate and conversation...

I know there are a few Yankee haters here. Forgive me, but I've gotta do something about Yogi.

Yogi (Berra, for you non-baseball fans) tripped and fell at a Yankee spring training game today. He was taken to the hospital; he's fine. He's also 85. And yes, he's still a character. 

A couple of weeks ago, NY Times sports columnist Harvey Araton wrote this wonderful story about the lasting friendship between Berra and Ron Guidry. It's also, I think, a touching tale of aging, the dicey relationship between "Old Timers" and current players, and also gives a glimpse into the magical and inspiring marriage of Yogi and his wife of 62 years, Carmen. 

Berra, the catching legend and pop culture icon, slips back into the uniform with the famous and familiar No. 8. He checks into the same hotel in the vicinity of George M. Steinbrenner Field and requests the same room. He plans his days methodically — wake up at 6 a.m., breakfast at 6:30, depart for the complex by 7 — and steps outside to be greeted by the same driver he has had for the past dozen years.

The driver has a rather famous name, and nickname, as well.

“It’s like I’m the valet,” said Ron Guidry, the former star pitcher known around the Yankees as Gator for his Louisiana roots. “Actually, I am the valet.”

When Berra arrived on Tuesday afternoon from New Jersey for his three- to four-week stay, Guidry, as always, was waiting for him at Tampa International Airport. Since Berra forgave George Steinbrenner in 1999 for firing him as the manager in 1985 through a subordinate and ended a 14-year boycott of the team, Guidry has been his faithful friend and loyal shepherd.

Guidry had a custom-made cap to certify his proud standing. The inscription reads, “Driving Mr. Yogi.

Here's the rest of the story.  Enjoy!

Today was a big day for Wisconsin. I wonder, however, whether it's not also a big day for American politics. Plainly the left believes that Wisconsin is the GOP/Conservative version of ObamaCare, something that overreached, and has now rallied a demoralized (Democratic) base, and will be repudiated. The picture in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal suggests as much (we shall overcome):

It's possible.  But I wonder. I'm not so sure the traditional imagery of left-wing agitation helps the cause here. It also seems to ignore a central question: Will Wisconsin -- and the other newly all-GOP midwestern states (that is, GOP governor plus both houses) -- improve? And will Illinois, the state that opted to stay completely Democratic, get worse? Methinks yes on both counts. That's a difference with health care: the more we know, the more unpopular it seems to get. If these states improve, the GOP governors are going to be heroes.

I also think it has in a stroke changed the political landscape. Just as the tea parties and 2010 made everyone from the last go-around (Romney, Huckabee, et al) look like re-treads, I wonder if the next two elections won't in some ways be pre- and post-Walker. Which is to say that if things get better there, people in other states will raise demands on their own governors -- as well as raising the bar for a GOP presidential nominee.

First Barbie, now this. Certainly not your mother's Chronicle of Higher Education.  This school is just one or two blocks from my in-laws, which is why I noticed. It's about Maryland's Teacher of the Year. Here's the paragraph explaining her expertise:

Her research explores the intersection of sexuality and psychology: An early project looked at the way that same-sex and opposite-sex couples negotiate power. She found that only in lesbian couples did money not determine which partner held power in a relationship. She recently presented a paper on genitalia as proxies for gender at a conference but would like to write for a more general audience.

I admit that I have been feeling a bit down lately.  However, Peter's post on optimism (below) spurred me to look around for something hopeful of my own to report.  You know what?  I only needed to remember the inspiring freshman congressman representing my hometown.  Read John Gizzi's piece on Retired Army Colonel Allen West and smile.

“Over this past week, I have watched and listened to members of the House of Representatives from across the aisle.  I am appalled at their arrogance, belligerence and dishonest rhetoric filled with empty platitudes.  Have they no shame realizing that their inept, incompetent failures are the reason we are debating this continuing resolution?  They failed to pass a budget during the 111th Congress.”  

No, that was not some angry blogger venting on his website, nor an acidic  radio talk-show host. That was Republican freshman Rep. Allen West, writing to his constituents in Florida’s 22nd District (Palm Beach-Fort Lauderdale).

How can we lose in the long run while the United States of America still produces patriots like Rep. West?

Congressional hearings on homegrown terrorism led by New York Republican Peter King have been criticized for allegedly stigmatizing American Muslims. Now, from the top Democrat on the committee, Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, comes this objection: "I cannot help but wonder how propaganda about this hearing's focus on the American Muslim Community will be used by those who seek to inspire a new generation of suicide bombers." Talk about stigmatizing! 

We took tea, by Boswell's desire; and I eat one bun, I think, that I might not be seen to fast ostentatiously. When I find that so much of my life has stolen unprofitably away, and that I can descry by retrospection scarcely a few single days properly and vigorously employed, why do I yet try to resolve again? I try, because reformation is necessary and despair is criminal. I try, in humble hope of the help of God.

--Samuel Johnson 

That's for you, Peter. 

Recording the weekly Ricochet podcast just now, we got to talking about Ricochet member John Walker's post, below, asking if there aren't, here and there, at least a few slender grounds for

optimism about the future of the country.  Rob Long, James Lileks, and our guests, Ricochet members Kenneth and Pilgrim--all replied, in a word, no.

Kenneth cited the illegitimacy rate, which is already high and still rising.  Pilgrim referred to the economic mess.  Rob made a brief but gallant effort to argue that, since the country has turned itself around before, it could do so once again.  James disagreed, noting that whereas moral rot used to be looked upon as just that, moral rot, today the elite class in the country sees moral laxity of all kinds, including the dissolution of marriage, as a positive good.

How can we reverse the moral decay?  The economic disarray?  Our staggering indebtedness? When James tossed the conversation to me, I replied, pathetically, "I simply don't know."

Which statement, if I may, I would like briefly to amend here on the website:  I don't know how we can find our way out, but I believe that optimism is warranted, even now.  Why?

To quote William F. Buckley, Jr., speaking at a rally at Carnegie Hall during Khrushchev's 1960 visit to the United States--in other words, at the height of the Cold War:

Ladies and gentlemen, we deem it the central revelation of Western experience that man cannot ineradicably stain himself, for the wells of regeneration are infinitely deep. No temple has ever been so profaned that it cannot be purified; no man is ever truly lost; no nation is irrevocably dishonored. Khrushchev cannot take permanent advantage of our temporary disadvantage, for it is the West he is fighting. And in the West there lie, however encysted, the ultimate resources, which are moral in nature. Khrushchev is not aware that the gates of hell shall not prevail against us. Even out of the depths of despair, we take heart in the knowledge that it cannot matter how deep we fall, for there is always hope. In the end, we will bury him.

The wells of regeneration are infinitely deep.  That isn't fancy happy talk.  It's a statement of knowledge about the deep structure of reality--a statement of a basic article of the conservative faith.

When I heard him speak in Washington ten days ago, Congressman Paul Ryan proved

 particularly striking in his sheer cheerfulness.  If anyone has an impossible job--if anyone has reason for gloom--then surely it's the young chairman of the House Budget Committee, who faces mounting budgetary catastrophe and a popular president intent on thwarting his every effort to avert it.  Yet Mr. Ryan proved at ease, spoke not only intelligently but serenely, and even managed to tell a couple of good jokes.

I'm with him.  

I hereby resolve to cheer up--and keep fighting.

Today is one of those days when I get confirmation that complaints of left-wing media bias are real and not a talking point.

After lone crazy Jared Loughner made his attack in Tucson, you'll recall the gut-flipping attempt by the left in politics and media to turn him into a right-winger and score political points calling for civility in political discourse.

Their repulsive opportunism was revealed when Loughner turned out to be neither politically right nor left.  Just demented.

We've seen that act before. Left-wing comrades in politics and media tried to immediately blame the right for Andrew Stack who flew his airplane into the IRS building in Texas and James Von Brunn who murdered at the Holocaust Museum in DC.  After it was revealed from their writings that each was a left-wing political adherent, media fell silent. 

With egg on their face over Loughner, the left promised that the Tucson murders would usher in a new day of civility anyway (which I felt was nothing more then a pretext to continuing the false allegation that the right owns Loughner).  

Ok - so let's see how that civility promise is going on the left, and if media is covering the broken promise.   Raise your hand if you have seen a report in the mainstream media about police in Wisconsin investigating this email, sent to Republicans there:

Please put your things in order because you will be killed and your familes
will also be killed due to your actions in the last 8 weeks. Please explain
to them that this is because if we get rid of you and your families then it
will save the rights of 300,000 people and also be able to close the deficit
that you have created. I hope you have a good time in hell. Read below for
more information on possible scenarios in which you will die.
WE want to make this perfectly clear. Because of your actions today and in
the past couple of weeks I and the group of people that are working with me
have decided that we've had enough. We feel that you and the people that
support the dictator have to die. We have tried many other ways of dealing
with your corruption but you have taken things too far and we will not stand
for it any longer. So, this is how it's going to happen: I as well as many
others know where you and your family live, it's a matter of public records.
We have all planned to assult you by arriving at your house and putting a
nice little bullet in your head. However, we decided that we wouldn't leave
it there. We also have decided that this may not be enough to send the
message to you since you are so "high" on Koch and have decided that you are
now going to single handedly make this a dictatorship instead of a
demorcratic process. So we have also built several bombs that we have placed
in various locations around the areas in which we know that you frequent.
This includes, your house, your car, the state capitol, and well I won't
tell you all of them because that's just no fun. Since we know that you are
not smart enough to figure out why this is happening to you we have decided
to make it perfectly clear to you. If you and your goonies feel that it's
necessary to strip the rights of 300,000 people and ruin their lives, making
them unable to feed, clothe, and provide the necessities to their families
and themselves then We Will "get rid of" (in which I mean kill) you. Please
understand that this does not include the heroic Rep. Senator that risked
everything to go aganist what you and your goonies wanted him to do. We feel
that it's worth our lives to do this, because we would be saving the lives
of 300,000 people. Please make your peace with God as soon as possible and
say goodbye to your loved ones we will not wait any longer. YOU WILL DIE!!!!

Rep. Michelle Bachman (R-MN) reveals that liberals leveraged last year’s super-majorities to pre-fund ObamaCare to the tune of $105 billion, shielding what was billed as a deficit reducing reform from the normal workings of a representative republic.  Instead of being subject to annual appropriations, ObamaCare funds itself unless specifically blocked.  Apparently, our Hope and Change agents somehow guessed that government-run healthcare would prove less popular than advertised.  The Heritage Foundation details the sleight of hand

Today former Congressman Ernest Istook testified before the House Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee about the $105 billion slush fund in advance appropriations liberals tucked inside Obamacare. The $105 billion bypasses the traditional yearly budgeting process and is spread throughout the 2,700 page legislation. It took the Congressional Research Service (CRS) seven months to identify all the disparate funds and it was not until February (11 months after the bill passed) that all of the funds could be totaled up

In other news, the Senate last night, with every Democrat voting en bloc, rejected the House plan to cut $61 billion from the projected $1.5 trillion deficit for this fiscal year. ObamaCare funding was untouched by the rejected proposal. 

So too little is too much for liberal senators, even against the backdrop of recently enacted massive “temporary” spending increases such as the failed stimulus bill.

Meanwhile, more and more of us are getting our daily bread from the government, either directly or indirectly.  London’s Daily Mail reports:

Government handouts now make up a record-breaking one third of the total amount of wages and salaries in the U.S., according to a bombshell new study.

The payouts – including Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance – are placing an increasing burden on the state at a time it is trying to dig itself out from a mountain of debt.

And economists fear the toll on taxpayers will only increase further if quick action isn’t taken before the majority of baby boomers reach retirement age.

Social benefits make up 35 per cent of wages and salaries this year, up from 21 per cent in 2000 and 10 per cent in 1960, according to TrimTabs Investment Research, based on data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Is anyone able to put an optimistic spin on all of this?

One of Rush Limbaugh's "undeniable truths" is that "words mean things."  When inconspicuously hidden in legislation, words can mean a lot of money to you and me.

Peter Pitts, President of the Center for Medicine In the Pubic Interest, has an interesting piece in the Washington Examiner about how a one word change in a press release by the Health and Human Services Department indicates they intend to do something entirely different with $1.1 Billion of your money than what Congress authorized.  From the column:

The Recovery Act of 2010 gave the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality $1.1 billion to conduct, according to the Health and Human Services Department news release, "comparative effectiveness research" into various "healthcare interventions."

Except that's not what Congress funded. Per the act, that $1.1 billion was earmarked for clinical comparative effectiveness, not comparative effectiveness research. And this is not splitting hairs. Enter cost-think.

Comparative effectiveness advocates favor large-scale trials that "compare" drugs and other health care "technologies," striving to show which medicines are most effective for any given disease state. Comparative effectiveness means cost effectiveness.

Clinical effectiveness, on the other hand, measures outcomes on an individual patient level. Clinical effectiveness studies help us to understand how to design treatments based on patient variation rather than cost. This approach represents the very definition of personalized medicine.

Read the rest of Peter's piece for an explanation of how Congress intended money for research into personalized medicine for you will be turned into a cost related excuse for rationing medicine for us all.

Fascinating!

For the record, I really detest the term "epistemic closure" and find discussions of someone's willful ignorance or close mindedness to be a worthless diversion.  But if there ever was a textbook example of epistemic closure, Paul Krugman would be it.  Writing this week, Krugman says:

Some have asked if there aren’t conservative sites I read regularly. Well, no. I will read anything I’ve been informed about that’s either interesting or revealing; but I don’t know of any economics or politics sites on that side that regularly provide analysis or information I need to take seriously. I know we’re supposed to pretend that both sides always have a point; but the truth is that most of the time they don’t. The parties are not equally irresponsible; Rachel Maddow isn’t Glenn Beck; and a conservative blog, almost by definition, is a blog written by someone who chooses not to notice that asymmetry. And life is short …

Worthless diversion concluded.  (h/t Volokh Conspiracy)

If you can't win legitimately, intimidate.  That seems to be the play book of the government unions (are those really teachers? Worry for the kids if they are.) One member of the assembly feels that they are trapped in their offices; the floor of the assembly has been overrun by protesters.  They're supposed to vote in 30 minutes if the police can clear the floor -- but they are taking over the capitol, coming in through windows. (Earlier in the week this member of the assembly reported that some of the protesters had defecated in empty offices and had caused $7mm damage -- lovely people.)  For people who talk about the "collective", it's really all about the self.